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happened here? Do you need
help?”
    She’s approaching me?
Alone? Is she crazy. There was something
off about her, but he didn’t think she was insane. At least not
yet. He kept his gun aimed at her chest. “Don’t come any
closer.”
    Her sinister smile widened. “Oh,
honey, I’m not the one you have to worry about.”
    In his peripheral vision, Connor saw
movement to his right. He shifted his weight to the left, spun
right, and fired his Glock at the approaching figure. The bullet
entered his attacker’s stomach. He staggered, and then continued
the motion he’d begun, attempting to smash Connor’s head with a
tire iron. Connor ducked and stepped back as it whizzed by his
ear.
    The woman scratched at Connor’s face.
He stepped back, but her claws sunk into the flesh of his cheek. He
attempted to block her, but she grabbed his arms and grappled with
him for the gun.
    Connor reached for the tire iron and
pulled his attacker closer to keep the man from swinging. Then
Connor elbowed the woman in the chin. The blow caught her off guard
and threw her head back. She coughed and struggled for breath as
the man’s strength faded with his coloring. He lunged at Connor in
one last, feeble swing, and then collapsed. The woman screeched,
her attack forgotten as she wobbled over and kneeled beside
him.
    “ Larry, honey, wake up.” His
glossed-over eyes stared back at her. She felt for a pulse, and
then glared at Connor. “He’s dead. You killed him!”
    Connor inspected himself for wounds.
His stomach was covered in the man’s blood and his pants were torn.
There were a few scrapes and he’d have to treat the scratches on
his face against infection, but he’d live. Confident of that fact,
he turned and walked away.
    “ You killed Larry! You can’t just
leave me here alone.”
    Connor took another step.
    “ Murderer!”
    Keep walking. T he rustle of footsteps
behind him told him others were appearing. He seriously doubted
they’d help the woman though.
    “ No, get away! Don’t touch him!” she
shouted.
    Connor didn’t look back.
    “ Help! Please some—”
    Connor reflected on the words of a
poem from his childhood. Little Orphan Annie was about naughty
children getting their comeuppances. It seemed fitting, and as he
left the grizzly scene, he muttered the phrase that ended each
stanza of the poem.
    “ And the goblins’ll get ya if you
don’t watch out.”
     

CHAPTER SIX
     
    AFTER EVERYTHING I’D seen and heard,
you’d think I’d be immune to shock, but clearly I wasn’t. My brain
froze, completely incapable of processing the information Ashley
had just fed me. I sat up and studied the girl, waiting for some
sort of revelation that would force it all to make sense. When
nothing came to me, I asked, “Killed them? Connor killed your
parents?”
    She nodded.
    “ But he’s your uncle. Your dad was his
brother, right?”
    She nodded again, this time looking at me
like I was a little thick in the skull.
    “ Why?” I had to ask. The guy—no matter
how repulsive he’d been in the past—had just saved my life. Slime
ball—yes, but murderer? And of his family no less.
    Ashley shrugged. “I don’t know why. I
saw him do it, though. He shot both of them. Then he caught their
house on fire.”
    Why? I repeated to myself. How could he do
this to her? I looked to Ashley for
answers, but nothing but pain and anger could be found in her
eyes. His brother? I would do anything to have my sister back, and this monster
had killed his own brother leaving his niece an orphan? Is this what I’m supposed to do? Save this little
girl from her murderous uncle? Her gaze was
too tormented for me to hold, so I closed my eyes and tried not to
dwell on the image of her watching Connor kill her
parents.
    Then I realized she hadn’t
called him “Uncle Connor.” But maybe family titles were lost when
one killed their relatives. And I
thought my family
had problems. Connor, you’re one heck of a sick jerk.
    Since